The Mermaid Theorem
by ClaptonJr
Summary: Fearing media attention after a close call and Charlotte's return, the girls and their boyfriends leave for America. Cleo and Lewis flee to Pasadena to hide, but also so Lewis can find work at Caltech. There, he meets the nerd gang. See what happens next! Following Cleo and Lewis.
1. Chapter 1

**A/N: This counts as a crossover between the Big Bang Theory and H2O, but I am only listing this under the H2O category because this will be the first of a three-part series there.**

**Also, this is just as Bernadette (from the Big Bang Theory) comes into the picture, and similarly just after graduation for the mermaids.**

The Mermaid Theorem

Chapter 1

Location: Pasadena, California

Raj and Howard entered a new nightclub they had found.

"Remember when we used to do stuff like this to meet women?" Howard asked, pushing open the door.

"Stop rubbing it in my face that you got a girl and I don't!" Raj exclaimed defensively.

"Bernadette is not my girlfriend. We haven't even gone on a date yet."

"Well, it's better than nothing!" spat Raj.

"Sorry. I meant when we used to come together," Howard mumbled.

"Oh. Yeah," Raj said.

"Hey, look at this!" Howard exclaimed, pulling a flyer off the wall. "1970's throwback every Tuesday."

"Aw, man. Today is Tuesday," moaned Raj. "Let's leave."

"Yeah, I don't want any more disco after what happened at that roller skating place," agreed Howard.

"You never told me about that," said Raj, suddenly interested.

"Remind me never to mention it again," mumbled Howard sheepishly. "Are we gonna leave or not?"

"We might as well-"

"_Ooh_," interrupted Howard. "Hot girl. Later, Raj." Howard pushed open the second door, leaving Raj behind in the doorway. He shook his head. Some people would never change.

The setup was very old-fashioned. It reminded Raj of the Indian American-style clubs. It was located on the street, with a large glass wall facing the street. It had a very open setup, providing ventilation. A bar was located on the right wall, and a dance floor was positioned in the center. On the left, about a dozen tables sat vacant near the wall. The only difference was that there was no smoking.

A welcome change, Raj observed.

A lively spirit permeated through the open floor plan. Couples and singles alike dotted the dance floor, shaking to the beat of the late 1970s. Raj made his way over to the left, sitting down at a table. He propped his feet up and began looking for Howard. Ten seconds later, he saw him, following a tall blond through the maze of people. _How stupid_, he thought contentedly. _That's Howard, all right._

"Can I get you anything?" asked a high feminine voice. Raj looked up to see a pretty brunette woman in her late-twenties standing beside him, holding a notepad.

Raj was paralyzed. He couldn't talk to women, due to his selective mutism. Thinking fast, he did the best thing he could think off. He held up a finger, gesturing for a moment.

"All right, I'll be back in a sec," said the waitress, running off somewhere.

Raj let out a breath. He really needed to fix that.

His best chance was to get a small amount of alcohol into his system. He hated it, but not its effects. Talking to women and getting a headache the next morning is better than nothing.

Walking over to the bar, he picked up the list of choices, deciding on a martini, shaken, not stirred.

James Bond had a way with alcohol. He was still able to drink low amounts of it, but it you shake it before pouring, the alcohol particles break up, leaving you with less effects.

Raj could almost imagine Sean Connery pointing at him, saying, "**DON'T TRY THIS AT HOME!"**

"You again. What do you want?"

Raj lowered the menu and saw the pretty waitress staring at him again.

He pointed to his selection.

"All right, sir."

In a minute, she brought back the martini. Raj picked it up and slowly downed it in one gulp. The waitress watched curiously.

"That's the fastest I've ever seen somebody down a martini," she said. "I assume you got practice."

"Yes," Raj agreed, silently cheering that the alcohol worked.

"Most people drink because they're alone, sad, miserable, or need to waste money. I did a study on it once." Said the waitress. "It's my thesis for my doctoral degree in psychology."

Raj set down the glass. "You have a doctorate?" he asked, amazed.

She shrugged. "I will. I'm working here to get money, but this is a prime spot for data collection. The people are usually so drunk they don't care how rude I am." She laughed ruefully. "Not exactly the largest data set, though. So, what do you do?" she asked, taking Raj's glass and balancing it on a shelf.

"I am an astrophysicist at Caltech, and I work with Dr. Sheldon Cooper. Currently we're designing plans for an experiment at CERN."

"Cool!" she exclaimed. "My dad knew some physicist. He is the reason my dad made me continue school. Looking back, I have to thank him. Being behind a bar is better than sitting at one."

She extended her hand. "I'm Rachel. Rachel Casper."

"Rajesh Koothrapali," he replied, shaking her hand. "Call me Raj."

"So, India-boy. You wanna dance?" she asked bluntly.

"With me?" he asked, shocked.

"You're the best person that's walked in here today. In fact, you're one of the few that isn't pathetic. Did you see that short man with the Beatle haircut and the ugly shirt chasing my friend Cindy around? He's just about average today."

"Gladly!" Raj consented. He knew "that man with the Beatle haircut" was Howard. But he didn't care. He was going to dance with a beautiful yet smart woman. _Forget Howard._

They moved out onto the dance floor.

"My baby moves at midnight

Goes right on until the dawn

My woman takes me higher

My woman keep me warm…"

Howard looked over at Raj and Rachel dancing. Disgusted, he walked off the dance floor and out onto the street. Maybe he was trying too hard. Bernadette sounded like a nice girl. Who was he to look for another option?

He was hoping that by the end of the week, he'd have himself a girlfriend.

**A/N This is my first H2O story and my second fanfic. Please review, people. This is just an intro chapter, but this story is going to have a lot of action. Trust me.**

**-ClaptonJr.**


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2

Raj and Howard sat inside of Raj's new car. The one with a new date wore a dreamy expression. The other was hunched up, shrinking below his already small figure. Howard, though angry at his "failure," still tried to maintain a conversation.

"This Rachel… she seems nice?" he asked.

"Yes…" Raj replied dreamily, picturing her face again.

"Ahh!" screeched Howard, pulling him back to reality. Penny, who was just driving home from the Cheesecake Factory, slid over the two yellow lines from the opposite direction. Raj spun the car to the right in the nick of time.

"You're driving a car, stupid!" Howard yelled.

"I'm stupid?! I have a doctorate in astrophysics!"

"Well, _Dr. _Koothrapali, nobody gives a damn!"

"Well, _Mr. _Wolowitz…"

_It's nothing, Raj thought to himself. He's just angry I got a girl and he doesn't._

"Oi, I'm Raj and I'm so special because I finally got a date," mocked Howard in a fake Indian accent.

_And now_, Raj thought haughtily, _I just earned a degree in telepathy._

(A week later)

Everyone (except Bernadette and Rachel) was sitting in Sheldon and Leonard's apartment, per usual.

"I hate Anything Can Happen Thursdays," Sheldon complained. "Does anyone else hate Anything Can happen Thursdays?"

"We have to make him hate it even more," announced Penny.

"Aww!" Sheldon exclaimed, clearly disgruntled. "Now you're going to give everyone bad ideas."

He paused for a moment. "Don't worry, fellow intellectuals and Howard. She's just attempting to use reverse psychology!"

"Don't know what that means, but I wasn't," Penny defended.

"Don't worry, fellow intellectuals and Howard. She's trying for an encore."

No one really went to sit next to Sheldon after that. They all go up and stood around. Raj and Howard happened to be at the island in the kitchen.

"So where's Bernadette? I assume things between you two are going steady."

"Not really," Howard noted. "She wants a commitment, and I'm not sure I'm ready."

"I thought things would be better," sympathized Raj. "A microbiologist and a micro-engineer. What could go wrong?"

Howard was not amused.

"Really, you gotta give her that commitment. She's great for you."

"Thanks, Raj. How's it going with _Rachel?_" The way Howard pronounced her name, he was clearly looking for a reaction.

"Fine," Raj said, sipping his beer.

"You screwed it up, huh?" inquired Howard.

Now it was Raj's turn to become annoyed. "Everything's fine," he spat.

"Is fine code for something? You can tell me. I don't care."

Raj delivered a sharp kick to Howard's shin.

"I'm guessing the show of force means yes, shut up," Howard exclaimed, wincing.

* * *

-Two weeks earlier-

"What the -!?" yelled Cleo.

"Yes, Cleo, Charlotte's back," breathed Lewis heavily.

"What are we gonna _do?_" Cleo groaned, running her fingers through her hair.

"Young lady!" exclaimed Mr. Sertori, throwing the door open with a crash. "You will not talk like that. You are lucky that your sister wasn't home. She might've heard you."

"The way she talks, she probably listens to Cleo more than you," retorted Lewis.

"Listen, Dad," Cleo soothed, trying to prevent a fight, "just let us talk for a little. There's a huge problem Lewis and I need to discuss."

Mr. Sertori's face fell. "Cleo, you're not pregnant, are you?"

Lewis choked on the air he was breathing. Cleo, meanwhile, lay face-down on a pillow in a futile attempt to muffle her hysterics.

"I assume that means no," Mr. Sertori said, relaxing. "Fine. We'll talk in a bit. And you," he pointed at Lewis, "behave yourself around my daughter." With that, he disappeared.

Cleo was still laughing as she sat up. "I'm sorry, Lewis, but my dad is sort of paranoid regarding you."

Lewis shrugged. "I'm just happy he isn't a judge. In here, it's not innocent until proven guilty. It's guilty until proven innocent." This brought another set of giggles from Cleo.

"Let's- (laugh)-we have to- (laugh) -tell- (snicker, snicker…) -the girls (laugh)!" Cleo uttered in between her fits of laughter.

* * *

"Charlotte's back? _ _ _ _!" yelled Rikki, who was on the other end of the phone cord.

"That's exactly what I said!" exclaimed Cleo.

"Cuss word included," interrupted Lewis, who was lying face-up on a nearby couch.

"We need a plan. Come down to the Café." Rikki ordered from the other end of the call.

"Okay, I'll tell Bella."

* * *

"Who the hell is Charlotte?" Bella exclaimed.

"Why are all these mermaids cussing so much?" Lewis exclaimed. Ignoring him, Cleo continued talking to Bella.

"What's wrong?" Cleo asked. "I've only heard you swear once before this."

"Cleo, Will and I were making out when you called…"

"Then why'd you answer?" cried Cleo.

"After that accident at the Café, Will jokingly set your ringtone on my phone to "I Am The Sea," by the Who. And let me say, it is really hard to concentrate on Will when Roger Daltrey is right over there."

Exasperated, Lewis rose from the couch and took the phone out of Cleo's hand.

"Okay. Goodbye. We'll see you at the Café in 30 minutes. See you there."

Bella was confused. "Wait, what?"

_BEEEEEP._

**_Sorry about the long wait. My computer died, and my computer guy was on vacation. _**

**_This chapter might be a little sub-par. I rushed it, so if there are any grammatical mistakes, don't flame me. Hey, at least I got in the H2O component this week._**

**_Also, I GET OUT OF SCHOOL THIS WEEK! After that, you'll have my complete attention._**

**_Whoa, overpromise. How does 30% of it sound? _**

**_Ha ha._**

**_-ClaptonJr._**


	3. Chapter 3

**Hello readers! Sorry about the late upload. I'm busier than I thought this summer. **

**Anyway, here's an entire H2O chapter for ya.**

Chapter 3

Rikki sprinted into the café, right through the bead-covered doorway and right around the counter.

"Hello, Rikki," Zane acknowledged, barely looking up from a clipboard. Still moving swiftly, she grabbed ahold of Zane's right arm and pulled him into his office.

"Rikki, this is our busiest hour…" he trailed off, sensing her unspoken fear.

"Charlotte's back," Rikki breathed.

* * *

When Will and Bella entered the café, it was nearly closing time. The café closed to the public at 5 PM every other Saturday night, usually to host private events. It was, conveniently, the second Saturday of the month and everyone had just about cleared out, but no event was scheduled. Instead of a large mass of people, the café was nearly quiet. Lewis was striding around impatiently, and Zane hovered around a whispering Rikki and Cleo.

"What?" exclaimed Bella angrily, pushing the beads in the doorway out of her way.

"What's her deal?" Zane whispered to Lewis.

"Cleo called at a bad time, I guess," Lewis answered.

"Why are you so angry?" inquired Rikki.

"Cleo-" Bella began, but was cut off by Will.

"Don't say it out loud!" he suggested/reprimanded.

"What'd Cleo do?" Zane whispered again.

"I told you. She called at a bad time."

"Bella's monthly curse?"

"No," Lewis said, trying to muffle his snickering. "Bella and Will were making out."

"So I was right… Ouch."

Zane's last exclamation was because Lewis had flicked his head, in a lousy effort to quiet him. It probably wasn't the best thing to do, but it worked at the moment.

* * *

The six sat, stood of hovered around a large central table. Bella listened with wide eyes as Cleo and Rikki talked about Charlotte, while Zane gently massaged the lower-back part of his skull when he was not shooting death glares at Lewis. Will listened to Cleo's stories with diminished interest, paying attention whenever he was tapped on the shoulder or overheard something important. But at the moment, it was much more amusing watching Zane and Lewis fight. His attention unceasingly fell back to their conflict.

He could make out Zane mouthing a swear word towards Lewis, which the latter saw. Lewis made a face, and silently mouthed a sentence or two in his defense. Will was (unfortunately) a satisfactory lip reader, so he could easily decipher Zane's belligerent words and Lewis's indignant responses.

"Will!" Bella exclaimed, tapping him on his shoulder. "Are you listening?"

"Mm? Oh, yeah, uh huh."

"Good," exclaimed Rikki. "At least you're paying attention." She put extra emphasis on _you're_, while casting a baleful look at Zane.

Will yawned, and looked back towards the girls. It would probably help if he decided to listen…

Then he felt something tap his calf. He looked up to see Zane trying to get his attention.

"Nice save," he mouthed. "If only I could fake it as well as you." As if trying to save himself from a long explanation, he pointed at Rikki.

Rikki, clearly annoyed, reached over and flicked him in the head.

"I don't know _what_ you two are talking about, but Zane, I saw you pointing."

Zane shrugged, wordlessly amplifying his statement. Will, out of the corner of his eye, noticed Lewis silently laughing at what had just expired.

-Later-

"Why did you flick Zane in the head?" Cleo asked. Lewis and Cleo had just left the café, and it was almost dusk.

"Um," stammered Lewis, "he…compared Will to Bella's period."

"Well, that was uncalled for!" Cleo exclaimed.

"To be exact, he called him a monthly curse," explained Lewis.

"And why did Rikki?"

Lewis took a large breath of air. "Will wasn't listening, he was watching Zane and I argue about nothing silently, and he found it pretty amusing. He lied when asked if he was listening, and Rikki used that against Zane. Zane whispered something to Will, and pointed at Rikki."

"What were they talking about?"

"I don't know."

"Rikki's been sort of tense around Zane lately," Cleo observed.

"Yeah," Lewis agreed. "They flick on and off faster than a capacitor."

Cleo laughed. "Except their current doesn't flow in circles."

"Oh, yeah." He paused for a moment. "I'm glad you're my girlfriend, Cleo."

Cleo looked up. "Where did that come from?"

"Let's just say your reaction to that joke was a lot better than Charlotte's."

Cleo froze. _He said Charlotte. Charlotte! _she thought. Her mind overflowed with a variety of emotions. Mostly jealousy. After everything that occurred, Cleo had pretended that the Charlotte situation had never occurred. It seemed childish, but in many ways it worked. She could just ignore the memories, and it would be like it never happened.

And now, instantaneous regression.

"Cleo, are you coming?" Lewis asked. She shook herself out of her trance.

"Hey, what's wrong?" Lewis asked, concerned. "You look like you've seen a ghost."

"I'm okay," she said, trying to convince Lewis as much as herself.

Far behind them, nearly out of sight, one Charlotte Watsford stepped out of the shadows. Unbeknownst to Lewis and Cleo, she was following them. Her resigned, almost passive last encounter with Lewis was just a cover. She had been in Los Angeles, working on her studies, when she ran into a Dr. Linda Denman in her Caltech office. Now, Charlotte had a reason to go back to the Gold Coast. And no, it wasn't for diving.

She watched the two walk towards Cleo's home, her face bearing a disgusted expression.

"I'm okay," Charlotte mocked. "That's what she thinks."

**Sorry, its short. I'm setting the stage for something big in the next two chapters.**

**Review, as always! Thoughts, opinions, and ideas are always helpful!**

**-ClaptonJr.**


	4. Chapter 4

Chapter 4

**Sorry this is so long. If you want to skip this inspiring commencement speech, read the H2O section and then skip the rest. But this speech is important later in the plot, so... I suggest you read it.**

Lewis knocked on the door to Cleo's house once.

"Funny, they know you'd be back here now, and the door's still locked," Lewis mused.

Cleo nodded her head in reply.

He turned around. "You're still shook up about that whole Charlotte thing, huh?" he inquired. Again, Cleo merely nodded in reply.

"Cleo, I'm sorry, but you have to move on. Charlotte's never gonna be a problem for us. Ever again."

"Really," said Charlotte, emerging from the shadows.

Cleo jumped when she heard the sound of Charlotte's voice. She spun around to see her adversary coming up the front walk.

"Get away from us, Charlotte," Lewis ordered.

Cleo concentrated on the fire hydrant on the street.

"Yeah, Lewis. I'm _so scared of you. _You and your fish girlfriend are in for it."

"May I warn you, Mr. Sertori is good with a shotgun."

"With my reinstated mermaid powers, I think I can handle it."

Cleo concentrated.

"And I have a feeling Dr. Denman would be very happy to see you-"

Cleo's mind seethed with energy, expelling it on the bulging hydrant…

"And you will finally get the fate you deserve."

The side junction on the hydrant gave way, and it exploded in all directions. The Nut holding down the cap was sheared off and propelled towards the deck. Just as Charlotte finished her sentence, she was struck at the base of the skull. Her face frozen in pain, she collapsed to the concrete.

* * *

"Did you hear what happened to Charlotte on the news?" Rikki exclaimed, at her usual table with Bella and Will.

"Yeah, I heard," Bella acknowledged. "Does Zane know?"

"He was there when Cleo called."

"What are we going to do about this?" Will asked.

"Hide, I guess," Rikki pondered. "Maybe we could leave."

"We'd be fine," Bella reasoned. "Will and I have no connection to Charlotte at all."

"Bella, don't forget about Charlotte."

"She won't be out of the hospital for a month. I think we'll be just fine until then."

Lewis rushed in to the café, pulling a chair with him.

"Denman called me," he explained between breaths. "She's coming back."

"Now, we have a reason to worry," Will sighed.

Back in Pasadena:

"How's my hair look?" Rachel asked for the umpteenth time.

"It looks _fine_." Raj answered. "Now go."

Raj maneuvered through the throng of people standing directly adjacent to Beckman Mall, where Caltech's commencement ceremony was underway. Raj could see Rachel find her place in the alphabetically-arranged lines before she disappeared into the robed mass of graduates.

"Hi, Raj!" exclaimed a high-pitched voice behind him. He turned to see Howard with his arm around a robed, fidgety Bernadette.

"Hello guys!" he said. "Bernadette-you're graduating?"

"Yup. Her thesis was accepted!" Howard responded. Bernadette, obviously excited, only nodded her head wildly in agreement.

"Congratulations!" Raj exclaimed, giving Bernadette a small hug.

"Okay, I gotta go now, wish me luck!"

"Good luck, Bernie," Howard said. Then, she headed towards where Rachel went.

So Howard and Raj made their way to the seats, as the commencement speaker went up to the podium.

"He looks young," Howard observed. "Maybe 21, or 22?"

Raj pulled out a small portable video camera, While Howard brought out a small radio-controller.

"I'm gonna fly the new VTOL prototype. It has an HD camera and microphone on it."

Raj smiled. Howard was probably going to crash his colleague's design, a military-grade reconnaissance platform. Howard, failing to realize its importance, remained painfully ignorant of the fact that it was ordered by the Department of Defense.

"Hello," began the speaker. "If you people are anything like me you are sweating like crazy right now. And trust me, it's not because of the hundred-degree weather."

"Greetings, and congratulations to Caltech's graduating class of 2010. I'm C. Alexander Casper, and, a fellow Caltech graduate, I was invited back to make this commencement speech. And, to start it off, I'm gonna tell a story."

"Is that Rachel's brother?" Howard asked.

"I don't know. She never told me about her family," Raj responded.

"There are these two young fish swimming along and they happen to meet an older fish swimming the other way, who nods at them and says "Morning, boys. How's the water?" And the two young fish swim on for a bit, and then eventually one of them looks over at the other and goes "What the hell is water?" This is a standard requirement of US commencement speeches, the deployment of didactic little parable-ish stories. The story thing turns out to be one of the better, less bullshitty conventions of the genre…but if you're worried that I plan to present myself here as the wise, older fish explaining what water is to you younger fish, please don't be. I am not the wise old fish. The point of the fish story is merely that the most obvious, important realities are often the ones that are hardest to see and talk about. Stated as an English sentence, of course, this is just a banal platitude, but the fact is that in the day to day trenches of adult existence, banal platitudes can have a life or death importance, or so I wish to suggest to you on this lovely June morning.

Of course the main requirement of speeches like this is that I'm supposed to talk about your liberal arts education's meaning, to try to explain why the degree you are about to receive has actual human value instead of just a material payoff. So let's talk about the single most pervasive cliché in the commencement speech genre, which is that a liberal arts education is not so much about filling you up with knowledge as it is about "teaching you how to think." If you're like me as a student, you've never liked hearing this, and you tend to feel a bit insulted by the claim that you needed anybody to teach you how to think, since the fact that you even got admitted to a college this good seems like proof that you already know how to think. But I'm going to posit to you that the liberal arts cliché turns out not to be insulting at all, because the really significant education in thinking that we're supposed to get in a place like this isn't really about the capacity to think, but rather about the choice of what to think **about**. If your total freedom of choice regarding what to think about seems too obvious to waste time discussing, I'd ask you to think about fish and water, and to bracket, for just a few minutes, your skepticism about the value of the totally obvious.

This is a standard requirement of US commencement speeches, the deployment of didactic little parable-ish stories. The story thing turns out to be one of the better, less bullshitty conventions of the genre…but if you're worried that I plan to present myself here as the wise, older fish explaining what water is to you younger fish, please don't be. I am not the wise old fish. The point of the fish story is merely that the most obvious, important realities are often the ones that are hardest to see and talk about. Stated as an English sentence, of course, this is just a banal platitude, but the fact is that in the day to day trenches of adult existence, banal platitudes can have a life or death importance, or so I wish to suggest to you on this lovely June morning.

Of course the main requirement of speeches like this is that I'm supposed to talk about your education's meaning, to try to explain why the degree you are about to receive has actual human value instead of just a material payoff. So let's talk about the single most pervasive cliché in the commencement speech genre, which is that a liberal arts education is not so much about filling you up with knowledge as it is about "teaching you how to think." If you're like me as a student, you've never liked hearing this, and you tend to feel a bit insulted by the claim that you needed anybody to teach you how to think, since the fact that you even got admitted to a college this good seems like proof that you already know how to think. But I'm going to posit to you that the liberal arts cliché turns out not to be insulting at all, because the really significant education in thinking that we're supposed to get in a place like this isn't really about the capacity to think, but rather about the choice of what to think **about**. If your total freedom of choice regarding what to think about seems too obvious to waste time discussing, I'd ask you to think about fish and water, and to bracket, for just a few minutes, your skepticism about the value of the totally obvious.

Here's another didactic little story. There are these two guys sitting together in a bar in the remote Alaskan wilderness. One of the guys is religious, the other is an atheist, and the two are arguing about the existence of God with that special intensity that comes after about the fourth beer. And the atheist says: "Look, it's not like I don't have actual reasons for not believing in God. It's not like I haven't ever experimented with the whole God and prayer thing. Just last month I got caught away from the camp in that terrible blizzard, and I was totally lost and I couldn't see a thing, and it was fifty below, and so I tried it: I fell to my knees in the snow and cried out 'Oh, God, if there is a God, I'm lost in this blizzard, and I'm gonna die if you don't help me.'" And now, in the bar, the religious guy looks at the atheist all puzzled. "Well then you must believe now," he says, "After all, here you are, alive." The atheist just rolls his eyes. "No, man, all that was was a couple Eskimos happened to come wandering by and showed me the way back to camp."

It's easy to run this story through kind of a standard liberal arts analysis: the exact same experience can mean two totally different things to two different people, given those people's two different belief templates and two different ways of constructing meaning from experience. Because we prize tolerance and diversity of belief, nowhere in our liberal arts analysis do we want to claim that one guy's interpretation is true and the other guy's is false or bad. Which is fine, except we also never end up talking about just where these individual templates and beliefs come from. Meaning, where they come from INSIDE the two guys. As if a person's most basic orientation toward the world, and the meaning of his experience were somehow just hard-wired, like height or shoe-size; or automatically absorbed from the culture, like language. As if how we construct meaning were not actually a matter of personal, intentional choice. Plus, there's the whole matter of arrogance. The nonreligious guy is so totally certain in his dismissal of the possibility that the passing Eskimos had anything to do with his prayer for help. True, there are plenty of religious people who seem arrogant and certain of their own interpretations, too. They're probably even more repulsive than atheists, at least to most of us. But religious dogmatists' problem is exactly the same as the story's unbeliever: blind certainty, a close-mindedness that amounts to an imprisonment so total that the prisoner doesn't even know he's locked up.

The point here is that I think this is one part of what teaching me how to think is really supposed to mean. To be just a little less arrogant. To have just a little critical awareness about myself and my certainties. Because a huge percentage of the stuff that I tend to be automatically certain of is, it turns out, totally wrong and deluded. I have learned this the hard way, as I predict you graduates will, too."

"Inspiring," Raj commented.

"Glad I'm getting this on film," Howard agreed.

"Here is just one example of the total wrongness of something I tend to be automatically sure of: everything in my own immediate experience supports my deep belief that I am the absolute center of the universe; the realist, most vivid and important person in existence. We rarely think about this sort of natural, basic self-centeredness because it's so socially repulsive. But it's pretty much the same for all of us. It is our default setting, hard-wired into our boards at birth. Think about it: there is no experience you have had that you are not the absolute center of. The world as you experience it is there in front of YOU or behind YOU, to the left or right of YOU, on YOUR TV or YOUR monitor. And so on. Other people's thoughts and feelings have to be communicated to you somehow, but your own are so immediate, urgent, real.

Please don't worry that I'm getting ready to lecture you about compassion or other-directedness or all the so-called "virtues." This is not a matter of virtue. It's a matter of my choosing to do the work of somehow altering or getting free of my natural, hard-wired default setting which is to be deeply and literally self-centered and to see and interpret everything through this lens of self. People who _can _adjust their natural default setting this way are often described as being "well-adjusted", which I suggest to you is not an accidental term.

Given the triumphant academic setting here, an obvious question is how much of this work of adjusting our default setting involves actual knowledge or intellect. This question gets very tricky. Probably the most dangerous thing about an academic education - least in my own case - is that it enables my tendency to over-intellectualize stuff, to get lost in abstract argument inside my head, instead of simply paying attention to what is going on right in front of me, paying attention to what is going on _inside _me.

As I'm sure you guys know by now, it is extremely difficult to stay alert and attentive, instead of getting hypnotized by the constant monologue inside your own head (which may be happening right now). Just one year after my own graduation, I have come gradually to understand that the liberal arts cliché about "teaching you how to think" is actually shorthand for a much deeper, more serious idea: "learning how to think" really means learning how to exercise some control over how and what you think. It means being conscious and aware enough to _choose _what you pay attention to and to _choose _how you construct meaning from experience. The alternative is merely unconsciousness.

Think of the old cliché about "the mind being an excellent servant but a terrible master." This, like many clichés, is lame and unexciting on the surface, actually expresses a great and terrible truth. It is not the least bit coincidental that adults who commit suicide with firearms almost always shoot themselves in: the head. They shoot the terrible master. And the truth is that most of these suicides are actually dead long before they pull the trigger.

And I submit that this is what the real, no bullshit value of your liberal arts education is supposed to be about: how to keep from going through your comfortable, prosperous, respectable adult life dead, unconscious, a slave to your head and to your natural default setting of being uniquely, completely, imperially alone day in and day out. That may sound like hyperbole, or abstract nonsense. Let's get concrete. The plain fact is that you graduating seniors do not yet have any clue what "day in, day out" really means. There happen to be whole, large parts of adult American life that nobody talks about in commencement speeches. One such part involves boredom, routine, and petty frustration. The parents and older folks here will know all too well what I'm talking about.

By way of example, let's say it's an average adult day, and you get up in the morning, go to your challenging, white-collar, college-graduate job, and you work hard for eight or ten hours, and at the end of the day you're tired and somewhat stressed and all you want is to go home and have a good supper and maybe unwind for an hour, and then hit the sack early because, of course, you have to get up the next day and do it all again. But then you remember there's no food at home. You haven't had time to shop this week because of your challenging job, and so now after work you have to get in your car and drive to the supermarket. It's the end of the work day and the traffic is apt to be very bad. So getting to the store takes way longer than it should, and when you finally get there, the supermarket is very crowded, because of course it's the time of day when all the other people with jobs also try to squeeze in some grocery shopping. And the store is hideously lit and infused with soul-killing music or corporate pop and it's pretty much the last place you want to be but you can't just get in and quickly out; you have to wander all over the huge, over-lit store's confusing aisles to find the stuff you want and you have to maneuver your junky cart through all these other tired, hurried people with carts (et cetera, et cetera, cutting stuff out because this is a long ceremony) and eventually you get all your supper supplies, except now it turns out there aren't enough check-out lanes open even though it's the end-of-the-day rush. So the checkout line is incredibly long, which is stupid and infuriating. But you can't take your frustration out on the frantic lady working the register, who is overworked at a job whose daily tedium and meaninglessness surpasses the imagination of any of us here at a prestigious college.

But anyway, you finally get to the checkout line's front, and you pay for your food, and you get told to "Have a nice day" in a voice that is the absolute voice of _death_. Then you have to take your creepy, flimsy, plastic bags of groceries in your cart with the one crazy wheel that pulls maddeningly to the left, all the way out through the crowded, bumpy, littery parking lot, and then you have to drive all the way home through slow, heavy, SUV-intensive, rush-hour traffic, et cetera et cetera.

Everyone here has done this, of course. But it hasn't yet been part of you graduates' actual life routine, day after week after month after year.

But it will be. And many more dreary, annoying, seemingly meaningless routines besides. But that is not the point. The point is that petty, frustrating crap like this is exactly where the work of choosing is gonna come in. Because the traffic jams and crowded aisles and long checkout lines give me time to think, and if I don't make a conscious decision about how to think and what to pay attention to, I'm gonna be pissed and miserable every time I have to shop. Because my natural default setting is the certainty that situations like this are really all about _me_. About _my _hungriness and _my _fatigue and _my _desire to just get home, and it's going to seem for all the world like everybody else is just _in my way_. And who are all these people in my way? And look at how repulsive most of them are, and how stupid and cow-like and dead-eyed and nonhuman they seem in the checkout line, or at how annoying and rude it is that people are talking loudly on cell phones in the middle of the line. And look at how deeply and personally unfair this is: I've worked really hard all day and I'm starved and I'm tired and I can't even get home to eat and unwind because of these stupid goddamn _people_.

Or, of course, if I'm in a more socially conscious liberal arts form of my default setting, I can spend time in the end-of-the-day traffic being disgusted about all the huge, stupid, 5 lane-blocking SUV's and Hummers and V-12 pickup trucks, burning their wasteful, selfish, forty-gallon tanks of gas, and I can dwell on the fact that the patriotic or religious bumper-stickers always seem to be on the biggest, most disgustingly selfish vehicles, driven by the ugliest (this is an example of how NOT to think, though) most disgustingly selfish vehicles, driven by the ugliest, most inconsiderate and aggressive drivers. And I can think about how our children's children will despise us for wasting all the future's fuel, and probably screwing up the climate, and how spoiled and stupid and selfish and disgusting we all are, and how modern consumer society just _sucks_, and so on and so forth.

You get the idea. If I choose to think this way in a store and on the freeway, fine. Lots of us do. Except thinking this way tends to be so easy and automatic that it doesn't _have _to be a choice. It is my natural default setting. It's the automatic way that I experience the boring, frustrating, crowded parts of adult life when I'm operating on the automatic, unconscious belief that I am the center of the world, and that my immediate needs and feelings are what should determine the world's priorities.

The thing is that, of course, there are totally different ways to think about these kinds of situations. In this traffic, all these vehicles stopped and idling in my way, it's not impossible that some of these people in SUV's have been in horrible auto accidents in the past, and now find driving so terrifying that their therapist has all but ordered them to get a huge, heavy SUV so they can feel safe enough to drive. Or that the Hummer that just cut me off is maybe being driven by a father whose little child is hurt or sick in the seat next to him, and he's trying to get this kid to the hospital, and he's in a bigger, more legitimate hurry than I am: it is actually I who am in _his _way.

Or I can choose to force myself to consider the likelihood that everyone else in the supermarket's checkout line is just as bored and frustrated as I am, and that some of these people probably have harder, more tedious and painful lives than I do."

**This commencement speech was told by David Foster Wallace. Titled "This is Water," it is one of the most inspiring things I have ever heard. It will continue next chapter.**

**Everyone, search "This is Water" on YouTube. I promise, you won't be sorry.**

**The speech will continue next chapter.**


	5. Chapter 5

Chapter 5

"This speech is going on forever," Howard complained.

"Come on! It's enjoyable! Remember how long _our _graduation was?" Raj countered.

"For the record, he lost me at banal platitudes. And our graduation was a _lot_ more fun."

Raj remembered his graduation from five years prior, when he had met Howard. The speaker was a bit late, so they struck up a conversation. Soon, Howard began to ignore him, focusing on a pretty blonde sitting three rows ahead of them.

"You didn't even pay attention," Raj whispered. "You kept staring at some hot woman."

"Uh huh. Like you weren't." Howard hissed, turning back towards the speaker.

"Again, please don't think that I'm giving you moral advice, or that I'm saying you are "supposed to" think this way, or that anyone expects you to just automatically do it. Because it's hard. It takes will and effort, and if you are like me, some days you won't be able to do it, or you just flat out won't want to.

But most days, if you're aware enough to give yourself a choice, you can choose to look differently at this fat, dead-eyed, over-made-up lady who just screamed at her kid in the checkout line. Maybe she's not usually like this. Maybe she's been up three straight nights holding the hand of a husband who is dying of bone cancer. Or maybe this very lady is the low-wage clerk at the motor vehicle department, who just yesterday helped your spouse resolve a horrific, infuriating, red-tape problem through some small act of bureaucratic kindness."

"Or maybe he just saw you and your mother five years ago," Raj chortled.

Howard glared back at his "friend."

"Of course, none of this is likely, but it's also not impossible. It just depends what you what to consider. If you're automatically sure that you know what reality is, and you are operating on your default setting, then you, like me, probably won't consider possibilities that aren't annoying and miserable. But if you really learn how to pay attention, then you will know there are other options. It will actually be within your power to experience a crowded, hot, slow, consumer-hell type situation as not only meaningful, but sacred, on fire with the same force that made the stars: love, fellowship, the mystical oneness of all things deep down.

Not that that mystical stuff is necessarily true. The only thing that's capital-T True is that you get to _decide _how you're gonna try to see it.

This, I submit, is the freedom of a real education, of learning how to be well-adjusted. You get to consciously decide what has meaning and what doesn't. You get to decide what to worship.

Because here's something else that's weird but true: in the day-to day trenches of adult life, there is actually no such thing as atheism. There is no such thing as not worshipping. Everybody worships. The only choice we get is _what _to worship. And the compelling reason for maybe choosing some sort of god or spiritual-type thing to worship - be it JC or Allah, be it Yahweh or the Wiccan Mother Goddess, or the Four Noble Truths, or some inviolable set of ethical principles - is that pretty much anything else you worship will eat you alive. If you worship money and things, if they are where you tap real meaning in life, then you will never have enough, never feel you have enough. It's the truth. Worship your body and beauty and sexual allure and you will always feel ugly. And when time and age start showing, you will die a million deaths before they finally grieve you.

On one level, we all know this stuff already. It's been codified as myths, proverbs, clichés, epigrams, parables; the skeleton of every great story. The whole trick is keeping the truth up front in daily consciousness. Worship power, you will end up feeling weak and afraid, and you will need ever more power over others to numb you to your own fear. Worship your intellect, being seen as smart, you will end up feeling stupid, a fraud, always on the verge of being found out.

But the insidious thing about these forms of worship is not that they're evil or sinful, it's that they're _unconscious_. They are default settings. They're the kind of worship you just gradually slip into, day after day, getting more and more selective about what you see and how you measure value without ever being fully aware that that's what you're doing.

And the so-called "real world" will not discourage you from operating on your default settings, because the so-called real world of men and money and power hums merrily along in a pool of fear and anger and frustration and craving and worship of self. Our own present culture has harnessed these forces in ways that have yielded extraordinary wealth and comfort and personal freedom. The freedom all to be lords of our tiny skull-sized kingdoms, alone at the center of all creation. This kind of freedom has much to recommend it. But of course there are all different kinds of freedom, and the kind that is most precious you will not hear much talk about much in the great outside world of wanting and achieving and displaying. The really important kind of freedom involves attention and awareness and discipline, and being able truly to care about other people and to sacrifice for them over and over in myriad petty, unsexy ways every day.

That is real freedom. That is being educated, and understanding how to think. The alternative is unconsciousness, the default setting, the "rat race," the constant gnawing sense of having had, and lost, some infinite thing.

I know that this stuff probably doesn't sound fun and breezy or grandly inspirational the way a commencement speech is supposed to sound. What it is, as far as I can see, is the capital-T Truth, with a whole lot of rhetorical niceties stripped away. You are, of course, free to think of it whatever you wish. But please don't just dismiss me as just some finger-wagging Dr. Sermon. None of this stuff is really about morality or religion or dogma or big fancy questions of life after death.

The capital-T Truth is about life _before _death. It is about making it to 30, or maybe even 50, without wanting to shoot yourself in the head. It is about the real value of a real education, which has almost nothing to do with knowledge, and everything to do with simple awareness; awareness of what is so real and essential, so hidden in plain sight all around us, all the time, that we have to keep reminding ourselves over and over:

"This is water."

"This is water."

"These Eskimos might be much more than they seem."

"It is unimaginably hard to do this, to stay conscious and alive in the adult world day in and day out. Which means yet another grand cliché turns out to be true: your education really _is _the job of a lifetime. And it commences now."

"I wish you way more than luck." And with that, he bowed and left the stage.

Raj, like the thousands of others in the audience, began to clap wildly. Not just for the speaker, but for the graduates. They began to tamper out into lines, and would soon receive their diplomas.

To his side, Howard was asleep. Why? Well, this year, he did not have the pleasure of sitting behind some cute girl. Clearly, he would have benefited from listening, but because of his _unfortunate circumstances_, he just couldn't stay awake. Typical Howard.

**A/N: Hello readers! Sorry if this speech/chapter/whatever confused you. I heard it on the internet, and found it very interesting. Also, I realized Raj and Howard would take very different views on it. Not only could I tie it into the plot and introduce another OC, but it was a way to kill two chapters. **

**I promise, the next two will be almost entirely H2O oriented.**

**-ClaptonJr.**


	6. Chapter 6

Chapter 6

**A/N: Hello folks. An equally split chapter. I've been lacking on that H2O side of the crossover, so here goes.**

**Also, this chapter starts to accelerate the (so far nonexistent plot).**

"It's nice to meet you," Raj said, after being introduced to Rachel's brother.

"Nice speech," Howard complimented.

"And you are?" Alex asked.

"Howard Wolowitz, I'm an engineer." They shook hands.

"I'm sure Howard would like a transcript of that speech," Raj smirked. Howard glared at him.

"I'm not sure if I can get you one," Alex said. "I don't have it on my laptop right now, and I lost my flash drive."

"Who loses their flash drive?" Howard exclaimed, slightly mocking him.

"Who falls asleep during their girlfriend's graduation?" Alex shot back. "Yup, I saw. Your tongue was lolled out the side of your mouth!"

"What!? Howard! " Bernadette asked, coming out of nowhere. Shocked, she ran off, and Howard followed.

"You are a lot like your sister," Raj complimented/didn't.

"Don't say that."

"So, what do you do?" Raj asked, trying to keep up a conversation.

"I have a doctorate in advanced astrophysics, and a double master for high-grade mathematics and aerospace engineering. In fact, I have a seminar this weekend. Wanna come?"

"When is it?" Raj queried.

"Saturday at 1:50, Beckman."

Raj nearly choked on the air he was breathing. Beckman Hall was one of the largest venues available at the campus for a speech. At least three hundred people would probably be there.

"Big speech," Raj said.

"I'm presenting each of my viable theories on interplanetary propulsion."

_Let's see Howard stay awake through that_, Raj thought. It was not the nicest thing to say, but still, it was realistic.

It's not like Howard was awake to hear it.

Raj laughed at his last thought.

"There's nothing funny about intergalactic transportation," Alex chided.

"So, let's see. We have a month until Charlotte walks again, and then Damnman-"

"Denman," Lewis corrected.

"I am well aware of what I said," Rikki remarked complacently. "Then she comes back, and we're screwed. Why else would she come back, except to expose us?"

"Study the offshore kelp beds?"

"It's possible, but unlikely," Bella chimed in. "From what I've heard about her, we'll just have to be more careful."

"If she's as determined to expose us as we are to hide," Will began, "she's probably going to catch us regardless," Will noted.

"So either we stay, we hide, or we leave," Rikki stated bluntly. "What do we do?"

Lewis smiled, showing his usual I'm-getting-an-idea-and-I-like-it face. "I have four tickets reserved on a flight to Los Angeles in six days, but my parents and uncle couldn't make it. I guess four of us could hide in the US for a while."

"Brilliant, Lewis! So who goes?"

"I was thinking about asking Cleo…"

"Can we come?" Bella interrupted, gesturing to Will and herself.

"Heyyy," Rikki complained. "What about Zane and me?"

Will winced dramatically. "You two, in an enclosed space together? The plane might explode!"

"No," Lewis corrected, "explosive decompression is always possible, but it won't result in a fireball."

"How about this," Bella suggested. "Rikki and I can swim to LA, and you two, Cleo and Zane can take the plane. We can swim at 600 miles per hour anyway."

"But I don't want to swim all the way across the Pacific," Rikki moaned.

Later that day

Everyone had gathered in Cleo's living room. Kim was out with her parents, so they could talk relatively freely. Rikki was allowed to go by her dad, and so was Cleo. Will had managed to evade Sophie, and Bella

"That's a good idea," Cleo mused.

"You don't have to swim eight thousand miles," Rikki pointed out.

"Well, I can't go," Zane conceded. "Not only do I have a café to run, but my dad would notice if I was gone. Besides, he's good friends with Denman. It'd be too risky."

Rikki opened her mouth to protest, but Bella beat her to it.

"Zane's right. We gotta cover our tracks."

"Yes, but five of us are going," Will stated. "There are four seats. Who goes?"

Eventually, they had decided. Cleo and Lewis were flying. Will, as athletic as he was, could not swim across the Pacific, and was thus given a seat. And both Rikki and Bella were brawling over the last seat.

"He's my boyfriend. I'm going!" yelled Bella.

"No, I get the seat. Denman's gonna come after me first. She doesn't even know who you are."

After another few [hundred] seconds of fighting, they decided to use the trusted technique of flipping a coin.

"Rikki, heads or tails?" Cleo asked, holding up a quarter.

"Heads," Rikki responded. Cleo flipped the coin through the air, and caught it.

"Tails," she said, observing the result.

"Two out of three?" Rikki pleaded, but to no avail.

It seemed like she was going to get wet…

**Sorry about the late update. My computer broke again, had to get it fixed.**

**REVIEW, REVIEW, REVIEW!**

**-ClaptonJr.**


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